The coking plant comprises a first row of oven chambers that all have the same width and, within tolerances, the same spacing and, parallel to the first row, a second row of oven chambers whose number, width, and spacing correspond to those of the first row of oven chambers, coal-input ports of all the oven chambers facing a corridor between the two rows of oven chambers. The two rows of oven chambers are offset with respect to one another in the longitudinal direction. In addition, the plant has at least one device for servicing the oven chambers and movable in the corridor between the two rows of oven chambers on tracks parallel to the oven chambers.
The oven chambers are charged via lateral coal input ports facing the corridor. For this purpose, a coal-charging machine is aligned on a track section in front of the oven chamber in the corridor between the parallel rows of oven chambers, which charging machine then loads loose coal or a block of precompacted coal into the oven chamber. After coking the coal, the finished coke block is expelled by a coke push-out machine from the oven chamber through a chamber opening on the rear side of the oven chamber and fed to a coke-quenching car.
Known from DE 101 54 786 A1 is a coking plant comprising two rows of oven chambers running parallel to one another, the so-called coking batteries. Two service machines are movable on rails between the two rows of oven chambers. One service machine has oppositely directed devices for charging the oven chambers in both rows of oven chambers and the other service machine comprises devices for pushing out coke so that oven chambers in both rows of oven chambers can be simultaneously charged with coal or emptied after coking. The service machines are only practicable for small-volume ovens. The rows of oven chambers are longitudinally offset with respect to one another by a longitudinal offset corresponding to an oven chamber width. The dimensions of the service devices installed on the service machine must be adapted to this offset. The relatively small offset of the rows of oven chambers produces constraints for the arrangement of the service devices on the chassis. Finally, the known concept requires an oven spacing that is always the same so that the oven chambers of the two rows of oven chambers can be serviced simultaneously without correcting the position of the service machine. Such an assumption is unrealistic in coking plants on account of the dimensions of these buildings. In practice, the width of the coal cake must therefore be reduced so that it can still be placed in the oven chambers in the event of fairly large positional deviations of the oven chambers to be charged. This reduces the throughput capacity of the plant and therefore its economic viability.